The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences today announced the shortlists for several categories for the 91st Academy Awards, including Best Original Score and Best Original Song. The nominations will be announced on January 22, 2019 and the awards show will be held on February 24.
Fifteen scores will advance in the Original Score category for the 91st Academy Awards. One hundred fifty-six scores were eligible in the category. Members of the Music Branch vote to determine the shortlist and the nominees.
The scores listed in alphabetical order by film title are:
“Annihilation” – Geoff Barrow & Ben Salisbury
“Avengers: Infinity War” – Alan Silvestri
“The Ballad of Buster Scruggs” – Carter Burwell
“Black Panther” – Ludwig Goransson
“BlacKkKlansman” – Terence Blanchard
“Crazy Rich Asians” – Brian Tyler
“The Death of Stalin” – Christopher Willis
“Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald” – James Newton Howard
“First Man” – Justin Hurwitz
“If Beale Street Could Talk” – Nicholas Britell
“Isle of Dogs” – Alexandre Desplat
“Mary Poppins Returns” – Marc Shaiman
“A Quiet Place” – Marco Beltrami
“Ready Player One” – Alan Silvestri
“Vice” – Nicholas Britell
Adés didn't make the cut apparently. No Red Sparrow or the other better Desplat score either - are there any other "snubs"? No Greenwood or Yorke either. No Giacchino.

Best Original Score – Motion Picture:
Marco Beltrami (“A Quiet Place”)
Alexandre Desplat (“Isle of Dogs”)
Ludwig Göransson (“Black Panther”)
Justin Hurwitz (“First Man”)
Marc Shaiman (“Mary Poppins Returns”)
A bit sad to see Newton Howard miss out, I still consider his Red Sparrow one of the best of the year even if I wouldn't give the score more than 3 stars.
I also prefer Desplat's The Sisters Brothers from this year.
No Adés either apparently. I thought Britell would be cited to be honest even if I didn't like his score much.

Maps to the Stars - Howard Shore
Imaginative and good, Shore's finest score since The Lord of the Rings, much preferable than the tired Hobbit stuff. Top 5 of 2014 material.
War Horse - John Williams
Still not a big fan of this. For all its characteristic craftmanship, it lacks distinction. Still, it is top 10 of 2011 material, maybe even top 5.
American Beauty - Thomas Newman
The best score of 1999 for me (followed by Titus, The Matrix, Star Wars: The Phantom Menace and The Mummy - now that was a good year for film music, full of highlights). Gorgeous, inventive - top 5 Newman.
Angels in America - Thomas Newman
Bliss, also top 5 Newman. I don't want to pick between this and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King for the best score of 2003 - both are two of my favourite scores of all time.
Michael Collins - Elliot Goldenthal
My favourite score of 1996. Top 5 Goldenthal. This is just tremendous and moving. This has to be one of the most underrated film scores out there despite the Oscar nomination.

How would you rank your top 10 living film composers?
1. Thomas Newman
2. Elliot Goldenthal
3. Ennio Morricone
4. John Williams
5. Howard Shore
6. Vangelis
7. Joe Hisaishi
8. Ryuichi Sakamoto
9. Hans Zimmer
10. Cliff Martinez
Newman is my favourite living film composer - he is the rare original, unmistakable voice, and for sheer inventiveness, he is hard to beat. Goldenthal is the most exciting living film composer. Morricone is more idiosyncratic and progressive than Williams. To me Williams is close to Morricone, but I prefer Goldenthal's and Newman's music over Williams/Morricone.
Shore has written more good scores than Vangelis, so he wins. I like Vangelis's Blade Runner more than anything Hisaishi and Sakamoto have done, and I also like a few of his other scores a lot. Sakamoto's music is generally more to my taste than Hisaishi's, but Hisaishi's overall body of film work is maybe stronger.
Martinez and Zimmer are close to each other for me. In general, I prefer Martinez's music, and I only really like two Zimmer scores and they are The Thin Red Line and Inception. Martinez has Solaris and Drive that I like a lot. I will give the edge to Zimmer for now, mainly because of The Thin Red Line though.
What do you say?

Lovely evocative cue that one. Little Buddha might be Sakamoto's finest film score. I think he said that he considers it his best film score. The Last Emperor is the one that comes close to me. I also like stuff like Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence, but mostly just for the theme.
Do you have a favourite of the film scores you've written?
Sakamoto: The most memorable that I've written is from Little Buddha – the very last cue from Little Buddha. I was so satisfied with the quality of the music, with the role of the music in the film, and Bertolucci also liked it. That was actually the fifth trial I did for that cue. Four trials were rejected by Bertolucci, and that was the fifth one, it was a hard task – maybe that's why it was the most memorable! Recently, the theme of The Revenant is something I'm satisfied with, too.

More Kevin Puts:
Puts has written in virtually every musical genre; is there something new he’d like to try?
Puts: “I’d like to write film music. I think I’m just as influenced in my own music by film music, and film itself as I am by art music. Some of the first music I really loved was John Williams’s film scores when I was a kid—Star Wars, E.T. I still love them deeply, and I have the scores now. I hope I can find a way to do that.”
- https://www.sfsymphony.org/Watch-Listen-Learn/Read-Program-Notes/Articles-Interviews/Original-Voices-Composers-Kevin-Puts-and-Anna-Clyn.aspx

The esteemed Thomas Adés recently in an interview said that he loves Williams (and Waxman, Bernstein, Legrand) in film music:
Obviously, there is a fine tradition of classical composers scoring film. Were there particular composers that inspired you?
Adés: "In film music, I love Franz Waxman, Michel Legrand, Elmer Bernstein, and John Williams. Of classical composers who have written for film: Sergei Prokofiev, Per Nørgård."
- https://bleeckerstreetmedia.com/guilds/editorial/interview-with-composter-thomas-ades?return=colette
Mason Bates wrote this back in 2016 about E.T.:

I didn't see this until now. Williams apparently wrote an advance review of Morricone's upcoming book/biography that is out next year:
"Throughout his long and distinguished career, Ennio Morricone has consistently proven to be one of the most imaginative and idiosyncratic composers in the history of cinema. This book reveals the powerful personality behind his brilliant work and will be rewarding reading for anyone interested in the magic of music in film." -- John Williams
https://www.amazon.com/Ennio-Morricone-His-Own-Words/dp/0190681012/

This obscurity emerges as one of this year's best film scores (what a weak year for scores it has been).
For fans of dark, unsettling soundscapes, this might be worth a listen. It expresses a dissatisfaction with the status quo.